


Heir apparent

by thankyouturtle



Category: Batman Beyond, DCU - Comicverse
Genre: Future Fic, Gen, Green Lantern - Freeform, Present Tense
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-03-25
Updated: 2011-03-25
Packaged: 2017-10-17 06:49:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 497
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/174067
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thankyouturtle/pseuds/thankyouturtle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Yu Jin's going to be a hero, one day soon.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Heir apparent

Yu Jin likes Neo-Gotham. Oh, sure, there’s manic criminals all over the place, but that’s not exactly different to what he’s used to. Besides, the city has heroes as well as villains; more than once he’s seen the Batman himself in action. Yu Jin can usually tell when he’s around; people will be running, yelling, away from him. Yu Jin doesn’t run; he watches. Sometimes he remembers his grandmother’s stories about the other Batman, the first one. But sometimes he just stands, and watches, willing himself to be older and stronger so that he can join in Batman’s fight. 

Yu Jin is on his way home from an English class one evening when he hears alarm bells. Most people stop, and look around; Yu Jin’s already running. He only really wants to find out what’s going on - at least, that’s what he’ll tell his father later - but when he sees the three masked men holding back a woman and emptying display cases he can’t help but rush in. The criminals don’t see it coming, because who’s going to notice a scrawny boy running at them when there’s cheap jewellery to steal? But all that means is that Yu Jin gets in three good punches before one of the men backhands him to the floor. 

Yu Jin’s up again in a moment. He can tell that the two men advancing on him think he has no chance against them, but now the woman they’re holding is struggling hard and anyway, he’s not a quitter. But before he can strike them again the room fills with green and suddenly the woman’s free and the men are all shackled in that same green light. 

And there’s a _hero_ there. Yu Jin’s never seen her before, but she’s tall and she’s sort of old and she’s grinning like she’s the best and she knows it. She’s wearing a green suit, and there’s a ring on her finger that has even more of that green light spilling out of it. She looks like she’s stepped out of one of Yu Jin’s grandmother’s stories. When she speaks it’s in English, but Yu Jin isn’t concentrating hard enough to understand the words, so he says, “What?” 

Her grin becomes less cocky and more sympathetic, and this time when she speaks it’s in accented Mandarin. “You need to take care of yourself better, kid.” 

Yu Jin spits blood, and ignores her words. “Who are you?” he asks. 

“Milagro Reyes, Green Lantern.” _Those_ words he understands.  

“The Green Lanterns went off planet.” Everyone knows that. “They left-” 

“And now we’re back, baby.” Yu Jin has never met someone who looks and sounds this arrogant before, and yet his mouth curls into a smile. He remembers his grandmother’s words, all of them, about all the heroes she knew and fought with. The Green Lanterns didn’t choose, she said, they were chosen. 

As soon as he’s old enough, Yu Jin is going to make sure _he’s_ chosen, too.


End file.
